Wedding Photos

Since this site is still getting activity even after the wedding, I have decided to post some of our photos for costume and wedding ideas.

Please feel free to like and leave comments. Good luck and best wishes to everyone!

Day’s Itinerary

11:00 am Bridal Party and set up crew will arrive to start preparations for the day. If you are interested in coming early, please do! We would love the help.

12:00 pm Bridal party will start photos.

1:00 pm Decorating and continuing set up.

2:00 pm Bride and Groom will hide away. Guests anticipated to arrive around this time.

2:45 pm Wedding ceremony starts.

3:15 pm Receiving line.

3:30 pm High tea is expected to begin.

4:00 pm Photo booth will set up stairs.

5:00 pm Short photo shoot for Bride and Groom.

7:00 pm Dinner and cupcake contest.

8:30 pm Bride and Groom will be leaving for the evening.

Cupcake Contest Rules

Alright, so based on popular demand, David and I have decided to create some rules for this infamous cupcake contest. Especially considering that there will likely be some spirited competition. We’ve already gotten lots of excited feedback on it!

The Goal: David and Amber’s “Smash ’em” Photo

The first place cupcakes will be featured in our twist on that traditional wedding photo where we feed each other the wedding cake.

Rule 1: Make ’em Look Good!

Because photos are forever, we would like the focus to be on the decoration. However, that being said, we would like to mention that these cupcakes are going to be our wedding cake, so …. nothing too weird please. We would like guests to eat them, too. Some elements to the design may be inedible such as a gear or two, but the cupcake it’s self should be completely edible and wonderfully delicious.

Rule 2: Keep ’em Steampunk!

Please adhere to the Steampunk theme when at all possible. The theme is pretty large, so there is lots of wiggle room here. If you are looking for inspiration, please visit the Theme & Attire page and view the video posted. It is an entertaining summery of what Steampunk and will give you a good launching pad to work from.

Rule 3: Things to Stay Away From…

     -Coconut

     -Angel food

     -Excessive amounts of chocolate

     -Too many inedible things (i.e. you cannot enter a dozen plastic cupcakes!)

Rule 4: Multiple Entries

Since some individuals will be more keen to baking than others, we have decided multiple entries are allowed. One dozen is an entry so what the heck— Go on a baking spree!

Judging: Trial by Fire

Because David and I are hoping to be more impartial, we would like to have guests vote on the cupcakes to determine the winning entry instead of having us arbitrarily picking our favorite (since this leaves room for bribery, and trust me, there have already been bribes ;)) Each entry will be numbered and guests will have the opportunity throughout the reception to view and vote on their favorite. Come 7:00 pm a winner will be announced. There will be door prizes for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place.

Any questions, comments, or concerns, please add to this post or contact us directly. We would love to hear from you.

Wedding Invitations

Finished steampunk wedding invites feature 3-D gear stickers and a square envelope.

If I have learned only one valuable lesson from this process of making my own wedding invitations, it’s that there is a reason they cost a lot of money to get printed. And much like my handfasting cord, when I meant to try and cut corners to save money, really all I ended up doing was having it exactly how I wanted. Not necessarily a final product that cost less.

Close up of the exterior of the invite which has metallic paper and gear sticker.

So, hopefully by now you have received your invitation and would gladly like to come to our wedding (which is why you are conveniently at this website I made). 😉

The invitation was designed by our Maid-of-Honor Natasha Wright (with a lot of opinion-expressing and expert advice from David and myself). David came up with the concept of the square invite and envelope. I wrote the text and Tasha, using her fabulous skills in Photoshop, InDesign and Illustator, created the invite itself.

All labels brought to you by Jamie!

My bridesmaid, Jamie Payne, created all of the labels, including the lovely return address labels from scratch in two hours (woo!).

I assembled the invitations in very little time which was awesome because I feared a time intensive process. Though I do have to admit that creating the invitations, from their digital incarnations to their physical forms (which includes a lot of address gathering!) was incredibly time consuming and so far the largest wedding project to date.

These are the completed invitations awaiting their trip to the post office.

Thank you to everyone who helped create, print, and assemble the invites, but I specifically wanted to thank those who gathered addresses for me: Mary Benbow, Sharlette Davidson, and Laurie Nelson. Without your help no one would be able to enjoy our lovely little creations.

David and I especially hope everyone likes their invites and we are looking forwarding to seeing you in 55 days.

To RSVP to the Wedding

We have been having difficulty getting the RSVP survey to appear on the website. Please look for it on the right hand side of the screen (right below the count down box) or right above the Mondaywedding header at the top of the page. Both links will lead you to the RSVP questionnaire. Don’t worry, it’s quick!

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me through email at: lxpetrik@yahoo.com

I will gladly walk you through it, screen shots and all.   😉

The 4th time’s the charm!

The finished handfasting cord in it’s fourth incarnation.

As I have said before, creating the majority of the items for my wedding has given me a great deal of practice with different media that I would never have touched on my own. Beading is one of those such mediums.

Close up of some of the beads and symbols chosen for the cord.

Handfasting was something that David and I encountered in our research of weddings. We both liked the idea and decided to go forward with it, however, like many other things for our wedding, this was just not something that you could go out and buy. It required pretty much making it. I did find some examples online to work off of, but for the most part it is such a personal thing that you need to create it yourself.

Displayed are both the handfasting and unity cord that we will incorporate into our ceremony.

Shopping for the beads took two days since there were multiple places we wanted to go to and we didn’t have the ability to hit them up right away. But than, even once we have them beading still took a week!

A Buddha head accompanies the other cross-religion symbols on our unity cord. Featured are items such as the cross, trinity, ying yang, star of David, crescent moon and our birthstones.

I strung up the handfasting cord three different times before I finally made it past my learning curve and figured out what I wanted. After that, I made the unity cord (David and I haven’t quite figured out how we are going to work this into the ceremony) which turned out perfect, so I went back and restrung the handfasting cord.

With so many attempts under my belt, it was nice to just be finished with it. And there is nothing quite like knowing the peace of mind that it isn’t going to fall apart on us.

Trial bouquets for the Bridal Shower

In this arrangement we have cosmos, baby’s breath, and “money” from the money tree.

Yesterday we went to the reception for our roommate, Brady Ramaker and close friend Jessica Whipple (she is also going to be the photographer at our wedding).

We had a great time dancing and being obnoxious at their wedding and we can only hope the same for them at ours! Well, with the exception of dancing. I will dance after intoxication, though not even that will get David to dance, so we’ll have to be content with chatting at our reception.

This is a happy little sandwich of daises, baby’s breath and, of course, money.

Anyways, on the 2 hour drive down to Rochester my mom called me and started quizzing me on what I do or do not want in a bouquet. “How do you feel about branches?”

“Uh, branches are fine. Can we have pussy willow?”

“I’ll try… I thought those would look nice too. What about jewels?”

“Sure.”

A big bright marigold with accompanying leaves and money.

“Buttons?”

“Buttons? What do you mean ‘buttons’?? What are you putting in my bouquet?”

“Just answer the question yes or no, buttons?”

“Yes, buttons are fine.”

Purple bachelor buttons, baby’s breath and a couple of twigs of decorative grass.

“Okay, now how about chains?”

“What are you doing? There are going to be more dead things in my bouquet than live things! I guess chains are fine….”

And so on went the conversation down the road for 5 cities, as David was kind enough to inform me.

But otherwise here are the trail run bouquets and the first taste at what our decor is going to look like when it all comes together.

Oh and the just plain fun random things that may or may not find it’s way into wedding decor, but is always there, just in case.

Buttons and jewels, oh my!

The Three Thruths of Spray Paint

Glass vase with homemade gear template stuck on it.

Because “Steampunk Themed Wedding” is not an aisle marker at any store I have every been to, David and I have opted for a Do-It-Yourself approach instead. As the video posted on the attire page states, when in doubt of whether something is Steampunk or not— just glue some gears on it!

Through my wedding planning experience, I have had the good fun of being able to experiment with a types of media. Which has truly been enlightening. For example, beading? Not my thing. It’s fiddly and tends to make me loose my patience.

But spray paint? That’s what I’m talkin’ about!

My gear templates.

First, I cut out some gears David was kind enough to download from Google images. He blew them up so that they would almost take up an entire printer page. Than we got to the exciting task of cutting them out (not so much ;).

We than experimented with metallic and black spray paint, as well as some adhesive glue on a particularly large beer bottle. Not a whole lot came of it and it hadn’t decided at all what I was going to do… so naturally I forged ahead.

Trail one with printer paper templates. It was a fail.

My mother kindly provided us with a number of mismatched glass jars which we were more than happy to turn into Steampunk decor and of which I was itching to spray paint.

I tried gluing them onto the glass jars and found that they were either A). not sticking well enough or B). sticking way too well. So I ended up with speckly gear shapes when I spray painted or I tore the template right off. Grr.

So, that is when I learned the first truth of spray paint.

1st Truth: Spray paint will come off of a glass surface with warm soapy water and a scrubby.

Good to know and this truth served me well.

Trial two was much more successful. The gears stayed put and peeled off well.

After I realized that printer paper was not going to cut it as my template I glued them down to a manilla envelope since the paper has a little bit more substance to it.

Once dried, I cut them out again (still annoying the second time) and glued them back onto the glass jars. In the first few trials the templates were too stiff, not sticking and letting way too much paint beneath them. I took a deep breath and momentarily wondered if Micheal’s carried Steampunk templates. The thought passed and I was finally able to get the things to stick! What excitement.

And, of course, the painting process flew after that. Full palm onto template to get it to lay flat? Check. Wipe painted fingers on favorite yoga pants? Check. Take way too many pictures? Check.

When the templates started to cooperate I learned the next two truths of spray paint.

2nd Truth: Spray paint is a tricky fellow.

Two of the finished centerpieces awaiting clear coat.

If you think that particulate matter propelled out a nozle by compressed air isn’t tricky, than you have never spray painted a thing in your life. It is a scoundrel and a jokster. And I assure you, you will not think it’s pranks are funny. Even when everything is going right, it will still work to undermine you and that is simply a fact.

However, shortly after I discovered the 3rd truth!

3rd Truth: Spray paint can be tricked in return.

The family of finished jars and vases. All that’s left? Flowers!

More than once, I found that the template and glue were just not working to my advantage, especially not with all of the little grooves on the edge of the gears. They have a horrible tendancy to pop back up. But I did realize that if you have a quick hand, you can press the template back down into the paint before it starts to set and you will at least have the impression of there having been a template there.

A visit to a hatstore….

A fairly normal top hat in a grey (which would coordinate with the suit).

David, the ever stylish one, has his heart absolutely set on wearing a top hat for his wedding.

As before we face the nifty problem of wear to locate one for the occasion. Top hats haven’t been in fashion for at least 100 years so this isn’t just a little jaunt over to J C Penny.

We heard from our endless source of useful information (Ben), that if we went to the mythical Mall of America, we may find that which we seek — a top hat!

The name of the store was Chapel Hats, which boasted a very large selection of hats though only two of which were top hats. One was a plain black top hat and the other a brown western one…. Not nearly what we were expecting.

In the end we made a special order for a Steampunk themed top hat that will hopefully be in by August. At this time, we are also looking for top hats online or through friends.

A showy Steampunk top hat that would also be acceptable.

If anyone knows where to find a top hat (especially if you have one in your closet), please let us know. We would be more than willing to take a look at it.

Flower Garden Update

A lonely little Cosmo hanging by the fence.

My mother sent me photos of what is actually coming up in her garden (as opposed to the lovely Googled photos I had on an earlier post in May). Needless to say, I was very impressed with the speed at which things are taking off.

The stars of the show are really starting to pop out.

The warm spring months this year have really thrown us for a loop since we didn’t know what to expect from the behavior of the flowers, but they seem to be coming up in a predictable manner, though earlier than expected.

We planted a few more packets just in case the early bloomers peter out before fall. Though there is likely to be ample amount of flowers for the wedding (and bridal shower too which a good chance to try out some bouquets), there is always that lingering fear that maybe, some how, we miscalculating and we’ll only have five flowers to a vase.

Mostly green looking weeds, but they’re really wild flowers. 😉

As charming as it might sound (think little kid tea party, right?) I would very much prefer that we stick with the idea as originally planned — an abundance of wild flowers flowing from the vases!

A large majority of the garden looks like a weed right now, but eventually we will start to see the real show stoppers coming up and out.